


Angels and Monsters

by bookfairy_writes



Series: Just One Yesterday [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Just one yesterday, fallout boy - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-07
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2018-09-15 10:26:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 18,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9230798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookfairy_writes/pseuds/bookfairy_writes
Summary: Sam, Dean, Cas, and Michaela go to a California Air Force base to kill a monster. Monsters may need killing, but that's not the only thing on Dean's mind.





	1. If Heaven's Grief Brings Hell's Rain

 

“Vegas isn’t even kind of on the way, Dean.”

Michaela glanced momentarily away from the road and at Sam Winchester, currently talking to his brother on a cell phone. 

“You don’t think maybe you’re being a little cavalier about this? Yes, cavalier. Well I did take the SATs so using the words would make sense. No, I’m not calling you dumb. Dean just--”

Sam stopped talking and looked sourly at the phone before sliding it back into his pocket.

“He hung up on you?”

“He’s testy right now and I don’t know why.”

“I don’t know, breaking down in a midwestern town with a lovesick witch in it might do that to a guy. Especially if he spent the night in a place with an attraction spell on it and didn’t get laid.”

“How do you know he didn’t get laid?”

Michaela chuckled.

“As a person who has slept with men, including your brother, I think I can recognize the strut and casual bragging well enough.”

“All men don’t strut and brag after they sleep with someone.”

“No, not all. But your brother does.”

Sam nodded and looked out the window, then at the map unfolded in his lap. 

“Looks like we’ve got another hundred miles before we hit California and then it’s another three hundred fifty or so until we’re even close to the base. And after all that, how are we getting on? It’s not like they won’t check behind us, this is the military. They won’t be warned off by a fake FBI badge.”

“Yeah, I need to make a phone call at our next rest stop. I’ve got another hundred and fifty miles on this tank.”

“You’ve got a connection on the base?”

“I know someone who does.”

“Who’s that?”

“Trade secret.”

Sam made a face but didn’t argue and Michaela was absurdly grateful for that small kindness. They drove across the desert of Nevada and into California, where deserts looked nearly the same as they had before. As the first hints of inhabited land became visible, so did the brightly colored gas station sign on one side of the road. Michaela dug through her pockets and pulled out a few quarters and a credit card, which she handed to Sam.

“Can you fill the car up? I need to make a call.”

Sam took the card and watched as she walked across the dusty parking lot towards a pay phone which looked half dead. She checked for a dial tone and began feeding quarters into it. After a moment, she began pressing the coin return button repeatedly. Sam glanced at the numbers on the gas meter ticking upwards as the tank filled and back to the nephil who had set the phone back onto its cradle and was headed for the building which advertised cold drinks and quick snacks in its windows. The handle in his hand clicked and Sam squeezed it a few more times, topping off the tank before he hung the nozzle back up and screwed the gas cap back on. A cold drink sounded good. Even if the heat was dry, it was still heat and he could see the wavy distortion of heat waves across the blacktop. After a minute or two, Michaela came back out, dug through her pockets again, dialed again. This time she held the phone to her ear for longer before setting it back on its cradle, this time with more force. Back into the building. Sam checked that the keys weren’t in the car before locking the door manually and walking into the cool florescent gas station store. Michaela was speaking in a tone that sounded pleasant enough but Sam could see her drumming her fingers against her thigh impatiently.

“No,” she said to the man behind the counter. “It ate my quarters. I did dial the 9 for long-distance. And I did check that the dial tone was working first.”

“It was working fine yesterday,” the man said and Sam avoided the scene by slipping into the men’s bathroom. By the time he was out, Michaela was pulling a frosty bottle of water from the fridge, which the man nodded at.

“Sorry for the inconvenience.”

Making a gesture that resembled a toast, Michaela took her water bottle and walked back out into the heat. Sam also purchased a bottle and on they went.

 

Between a long ride with Cas and Sam’s tone, Dean was not having a good drive. He thought he’d made it clear--they weren’t talking about what happened until the case was over. And here was Cas, trying for a chick-flick moment to talk about what was going on with them. Dean didn’t mean to snap at Sam, nor did he mean to snap at Cas less than thirty minutes later when Castiel asked a poorly-phrased question. But he did and now Cas was looking out the window with a sulking air about him and Sam hadn’t called back. He was ahead of the other car but some part of him wanted to drag this trip out so he wouldn’t have to talk to Cas about whatever had happened. If he was under the influence of a spell, did that negate what had happened? Was Cas affected too? Was this like a more extreme version of their drunken kiss?

Dean thought about the first hunt he’d taken Sam on, the one when he snuck into his Stanford apartment in the middle of the night and convinced his brother to come along for awhile. It was easy then--research, flash fake badges, do some good old-fashioned detective work and then boom, ghost taken care of. Now things were more complicated. There was Cas for one thing, but he didn’t even want to think about the complexity of that relationship, at least not with Cas sitting right there. He felt restless, even on this hunt. He hunted monsters, that’s what he did, but there was some itch that needed scratching and this hunt wasn’t doing it. Maybe it was because they weren’t there yet. According to the exit signs, there was only another thirty miles to go and then...well actually the ‘then’ was still in progress. They’d never broken onto a military base, at least not that he remembered. And it was the sort of thing one tends to remember. His phone rang and Dean picked it up without even looking at the caller ID.

“Hello?”

“I called Garth about getting us in. There’s a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy and he’s going to meet us at the gate.”

“I thought Michaela had an in.”

Sam paused and Dean waited for his brother to spit it out.

“She can’t seem to contact them.”

There was something in his pause that made Dean want to ask about it, but later. As much as he liked Michaela, she wasn’t family and Dean trusted family first. Instead of asking, he just said, “Okay,” and hung up. He glanced at Cas, still looking out the window and sulking, and sighed in a loud, irritated huff.

“Cas.”

The angel ignored him and Dean resisted the urge to shove him in the shoulder.

“Cas we’re on a case. You can have your chick flick moments later.”

The words were wrong but they popped out of his mouth easily and he winced as Cas turned to face him.

“I was unaware that my thinking was so bothersome to you.” He was using that cool tone, the ‘asshole angel’ one he’d favored before he loosened up a bit.

“Cas, just...we need to have each other’s backs.”

“Regardless of whether or not I am pleased with you, Dean, I will always have your back,” he said gravely. And promptly popped out of existence. Dean swore and smacked the dashboard with the heel of his hand. It wasn’t like he wasn’t trying here. He’d talked to Cas. They’d tabled the conversation that probably needed to happen until after the hunt. He was being a damn adult about this and if the angel could get with the program, his life would be a hell of a lot easier.

  
  


The gate onto Johnson Airforce Base had a line and Sam called Dean to let him know which lane to be in. Their guy was on lane four and the cars needed to be in that lane if they wanted to get in. When Michaela rolled down her window, Sam was surprised to see that Garth’s ‘guy’ was a petite woman with a heart-shaped pixie face and black hair twisted into a clean military bun.

“Garth sent us,” Sam said from the passenger seat, and Michaela offered the woman two driver’s licenses. 

“Don’t speed,” the woman advised. “If you do anything to get picked up here, I lose my job, there might be charges pressed, and you don’t want to deal with military tribunals. My wife is at this address, she knows Garth and can find you somewhere to stay.”

Michaela took the slip of paper pressed between her driver’s license and Sam’s, nodding.

“Thank you.”

“Just kill whatever is getting these women.”

“We will.”

As she rolled up the window, Sam muttered, ‘hopefully’ in a manner that was less-than-confident.

“Thanks for that.”

“Listen, I don’t know much about you. I know you drive a car disguised as trash, can do a little magic, have angel blood, and banged my brother. That’s about everything. But I do know you’re a hunter and unless the trail goes cold, we don’t give up. So if you left a case to do more digging, I can assume it’s not going to be an open-and-shut thing. Hell, you said you don’t even know what it is. I’m just concerned, okay?”

Michaela ran a hand over her hair, tugging absentmindedly at her ponytail. 

“You’re right. I hate that I need help with this and I hate that whatever this thing is, it’s still killing women. But the pessimism isn’t helping.”

“Sorry,” Sam muttered and Michaela nodded.

“Thanks.”

“For what?”

“Apologizing. Guys don’t have a habit of doing that. Hunters even less so. We’re all on defensive all the time trying not to get killed that common courtesy falls to the wayside.”

“You know a lot of hunters?”

“A few.”

“Any of them know about...you know?”

“My slightly less-than-human nature? One does. A witch my moms are friends with. She’s the reason I didn’t accidentally destroy moms’ house as a kid. Fun fact, puberty plus superpowers is a terrible combination.”

“You know a hunter who’s a witch?”

“Just the one. And she’s more of a consultant. She’s not big on the shooting and stabbing and chasing. Or the travel, seeing as petsitters cost an arm and a leg”

“Does she have cats?”

“Dogs, actually. Some kind of wolfhound mix.”

The buildings they passed were dated brick or cinderblock, the trim off-white and the windows divided into six panes apiece. Even the houses which were clearly newer based on an older design had the same look, the same feel. Everything had the same feel, like time had somehow stopped on a dusty California afternoon. Despite the cars passing by from crappy little Hondas with peeling paint to a few new Mustangs, the backdrop was still, a pause for breath that never restarted.

The house they pulled up in front of was a small single-story brick with roofing tiles that resembled clay but probably weren’t. It was attached to another identical house along its left side with rickety carports bracketing the structure. Michaela pulled up behind the Impala on the street before the house and watched as Dean got out, then Cas. In her seat, Michaela shivered as a chill raced through her. Sam glanced over but she was already opening her car door, climbing out and pushing the door shut. 

A woman had already opened the door and was smiling up at Dean when Sam and Michaela caught up. 

“Lacey said you’d be by.”

“Lacey?”

“My wife. You met her at the gate. The cute one.” She offered an impish grin.

“Come in, have some coffee. And you can keep that car in my girlfriend’s garage. It’s a nice car but it’s conspicuous as hell. The rust-bucket isn’t great either, but at least nobody is going to stop and have a chat about it.”

“I can clean it up a little.”

“Hang on there, I’m not parking Baby in some neighbor’s garage.”

“Baby?” asked the woman at the same time that Michaela asked what kind of coffee she had.

Conversation from there became shuffled, several dialogues going on at once. Through it, though, came four mugs of coffee, a rough series of introductions, and a jumbled story of the hunt from Michaela mostly with some additional opinions from Sam and Dean. Castiel stayed uncharacteristically silent while he sipped coffee. Dean glanced over and resisted smiling at the angel’s thoughtful expression as he took careful mouthfuls. With the story told, Ashley offered refills.

“I’ve got a couple of rooms booked under our name at the on-base hotel.” 

Ashley met each of their eyes in turn.

“Do not make a mess. Do not make a big noise. This isn’t a small town, it’s the military. The usual hunter thing doesn’t work. Bluster and threats and fake badges, it’s not going to fly here. And it’s going to come down on Lacey and me. We’re one of the only gay married couples on the base, one of the first. And if you fuck this up for us, I will personally end you.”

Castiel stood, suddenly menacing and Dean threw an arm out to hold him back.

“No, Cas. She’s right...you’re right. We won’t mess this up.”

Ashley nodded, dark curls bobbing around her face.

“Good. Then let’s get you all where you need to be to kill this thing.


	2. I Would Trade All My Tomorrows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Waiting for information is no fun. Thankfully, there is bowling and action movies and mild sexual tension to keep everyone occupied.

 

The military hotel was nicer than Dean expected, certainly a step up from the seedy motels they were used to. It wasn’t the Ritz or anything, but everything was clean, the blankets were folded in clean creases, and there were mints on the pillows. They’d gotten two rooms, each with two queen-sized beds. 

“Chocolate-covered mints!” Dean exclaimed as he popped the third one into his mouth. 

“Dean, come on.”

“Snooze you lose, Sammy.”

As he tossed the last mint into his mouth, Dean grinned, his irritation over having Baby in some stranger’s garage seemingly forgotten. Sam rolled his eyes.

A knock came through the wall and a few moments later, one on the door. 

“You going to let me in?”

“Is there an option for me to say no?” 

Sam was still smirking when he opened the door and found Michela standing there, looking less than amused.

“The angel is funnier than you.”

“The angel has a name,” Dean said sharply and Michaela nodded apologetically in Castiel’s direction. 

“Okay, what’s the plan?”

“Sam’s seen everything I have. Three women. I’ll have to check the news around here to be sure, but I think it’s just those three. There’s usually a month or more between each killing, which is why I’m pretty sure it’s not a vampire. That and the wards the damn thing broke. Even with all the files, we’re still pretty limited on what we know. Finding a list of every pregnant woman on base isn’t going to be possible and hanging out around the clinics is impractical as well as creepy.”

Sam pulled his laptop out.

“You think I can’t hack the medical files?”

“Ashley said not to make any trouble, remember?”

“I’ll cover my tracks.”

Michaela chewed briefly on her lower lip.

“I don’t like it.”

“I’m not a fan of it either, but if it’s break a few HIPPA laws or investigate another murder, I’m voting the one which doesn’t involve another dead person.”

Sam began to type and made a face.

“This might take awhile though. Military records are going to be tough to get into and once you add the additional security protocols for medical information…”

“How much time?” Dean asked.

“Hours.”

“A little more specific, Sammy?”

“This one’s over my head. I need to make some calls. Give me two hours and then maybe I’ll have an estimate of how long it will take.”

“And until then?”

“I don’t know Dean, I’m sure you’ll figure something out.”

  
  


“Bowling?”

Dean looked from the puzzled angel to the aghast-looking Nephil and grinned.

“It’s all-American fun!”

“Oh my God.” Michaela managed to sound both offended and embarrassed.

“Don’t blaspheme.”

“It’s my grandfather.”

“And my Father.”

“Guys,” Dean interrupted. “Come on. Bowling. A few beers. Deep-fried food.”

“Carpeting which might have been cool in the 80s, when it was installed.”

“That’s the spirit!”

“There has got to be something we can do to make progress on the case.”

“Sam already said there isn’t. Cas, what’s your shoe size?”

“Uhh.” The angel looked at his shoe, then back at Dean. “Why is this relevant?”

“We gotta get bowling shoes, Cas.”

“Are my shoes insufficient?”

“It’s a bowling alley thing,” Michaela grumbled. “You have to wear special shoes that like 100 people before you have worn, half of which probably had leprosy or foot fungus or a weird STD.”

Dean shot her a look.

“Who do you think hangs out at bowling alleys?”

“Well people like you, which isn’t a vote of confidence.”

“Come on,” Dean beckoned and when both angel and nephil stared at him, he took Cas’s hand and lead him to the counter, Michaela reluctantly trailing behind them.

“Three bowlers, three shoes.”

“Sizes?” The clerk looked bored, and Michaela wondered idly if by some miracle, the bowling alley was haunted or had a vampire nest in it. If there was something to be done in this place other than bowling. She told the clerk her shoe size and was handed a pair of red and blue lace-up shoes with a big yellow number 7 on the side before shuffling petulantly to the designated lane.

“It’s a stupid pastime,” she told Dean as her ball rolled into the gutter for the fourth time. 

“You just suck at bowling.”

“You are very bad at this,” Castiel agreed as he picked his neon orange ball from the ball return.

“Thanks.”

“Come on, cheap beer, fried food, some wholesome family fun, what’s not to love?” Dean took a swig of beer and Michaela eyed the score. On their sixth turns, Michaela had a whopping 14, Castiel a respectable 45, and Dean’s score had yet to be calculated as his last two bowls were a spare and a strike. 

“Human customs often revolve around food and some kind of game.”

“As opposed to angel ones, which mostly involve sitting around with sticks up their asses.”

Castiel didn’t even pause before replying.

“Angels without vessels have no asses.”

Dean choked back a laugh and instead sprayed the basket of mini-corn dogs with a mist of watery beer.

“I’m not eating those,” Michaela told him and he shrugged.

“More for me. Cas? Corn dog?”

“I have no desire for small wrapped sausages, thank you.”

“Just the big ones, right?” 

Dean and Cas both looked at Michaela, red and silent.

“Okay, dick jokes don’t fly with this crowd. Got it.”

She stepped up to take her turn and Dean glanced at Castiel, who was already looking back at him. 

As Michaela’s ball clipped a corner pin and knocked over three, he shook his head subtly.

“Later,” he muttered and the angel nodded equally subtly as Michaela turned to retrieve her ball.

 

Smelling faintly of grease, the three of them returned to the hotel room where Sam was passed out diagonally across the bed. His phone sat on the mattress next to him and a bit of drool pooled from his open mouth onto the comforter. Dean jumped onto the bed, tossing Sam a few inches into the air.

“Wake up Sasquatch.”

“Dean!”

“Sleeping on the job, Sammy. That’s a no-go.”

“I was asleep for like ten minutes, tops.”

“The drool puddle says differently, sleeping beauty.”

“I don’t--” Sam swiped his hand across his chin to clear away the drool in question. “Shut up.”

“Status on the database?” Michaela asked.

“By tomorrow morning, probably eleven hundred.”

“That’s freakin’ forever.”

“Dean, it’s a military medical database, not a traffic cam. It’s going to take time, and someone who knows what they’re doing.”

Both brothers paused for a moment, looking somber and Michaela glanced at Castiel to try and get a read on the situation. Stonefaced as ever, the angel was very little help. Still, she didn’t ask, instead announcing her intent to go wash the grease out of her skin.

“Along with the taste of failure?” Dean called after her, but she was already out the door.

“Where did you go?”

“Bowling.” Castiel blinked at him as he said it. “It was...interesting.”

“Cas did pretty good for a first-timer. Ninety-two points.”

“And you?”

“Come on Sammy, I bowled a 145. And Michaela got a 39.”

“Not much of a bowler, huh?” He didn’t question why Dean had chosen bowling of all things.

“I swear it was like watching a three-year old play. She was in the gutter more than in the lane.”

“Yeah, she seemed a bit irritated.”

“Sore loser,” Dean shrugged. 

After her shower, Michaela knocked on the door and found Dean entranced in Top Gun. Cas seemed to spend just as much time watching Dean as he did the television and Sam returned to the tiny couch where he sprawled across it with his laptop in his lap. 

“One of you needs to give me a key to this room.”

“Ha!” Dean bellowed. “Not happening. I don’t want you barging in here.”

“I don’t barge.”

“You barge.”

“I’m going to not take that personally.”

“Take it however you want it, you’re not getting a key.”

“What if something gets in there and starts swinging?”

“Then I have Sam and Cas on my back.”

“At night?”

“I don’t sleep,” Cas said gravely.

“Because that’s not creepy.”

Sam looked over at Dean, waiting for him to make a remark. He usually did; as much as he and Cas got along, he ragged on Cas like he did on Sam. It was one of the ways he showed affection. Dean, however, was strangely silent. His attention was almost singularly fixed on the movie. After waiting a moment, Sam coughed.

“So you’re not an action movie fan?”

“I didn’t say that. I wanted to get a key to the room.”

“Which you’re not getting,” Dean said. “You can watch Top Gun or you can go do something else. The key isn’t happening. Let it go.”

They finished Top Gun and got burgers. There was another action movie after that, during which Michaela went back to her room. She was just beginning to drift off when an alert on her phone chimed. Rolling over, she picked up the phone and squinted at the blue-white light. New text from Ma.

_ Any updates? _

Sleepily, Michaela texted back ‘nothing yet’ and went back to sleep. Hopefully tomorrow there would be more news.

 

The call came in at eight AM and Sam answered, still in bed. Cas looked up from the bible he’d taken from the nightstand drawer to listen. 

“Emailing me the list is fine. And can you get me the records of the dead women? No, that’s fine. Thanks.”

Dean rubbed at his eyes.

“Doesn’t she already have the victim records?” he jabbed his thumb in the general direction of Michaela’s room.

“I didn’t see them, just notes.”

“Sloppy.”

Sam shrugged. 

“It took Roger over 12 hours to get what we needed. I wouldn’t be surprised if she couldn’t get access.”

He was on his laptop, scrolling through the list of names and addresses he was emailed.

“There are a lot of pregnant women on this base, Dean.”

“I guess we’ll split up then. You wanna wake her up?”

“I’m going to shower.”

Dean leapt up in the hopes of beating Sam there and got an elbow in the throat for his efforts.

“Bitch!”

“Snooze you lose, jerk.”

When he knocked on the door to Michaela’s room, however, he could hear the shower running and turned back to his and Sam’s room to find Castiel sitting on the bed, staring intently at him. 

“Uh..hey Cas.”

Dean rubbed the back of his neck, scratching where the tag on his shirt rubbed against his skin. 

“Dean,” the angel said gravely. “We need to talk.”

Dean glanced at the door to the bathroom, then the door to the hall, and nodded curtly.

“We gotta make it quick. Sam may take forever to wash his hair, but it’s still fifteen minutes tops. Twenty if he decides to do a deep conditioning treatment.”

“You’re uncomfortable.”

Dean turned on his heel to pace back and forth, the movement bleeding out some of the nervous energy.

“Yeah Cas, I’m uncomfortable. I had a weird sexual encounter with my best friend while under the influence of some spell. I’m flinching every time she,” he jabbed his finger in the direction of the wall “makes a dick joke because this isn’t something I want out in the open!”

He said all of this in a heated whisper, eyes flicking towards the two doors out of the main room.

“Dean, they don’t know.”

“How can you possibly know that?”

“Sam would say something. I don’t know much about the nephil but your brother would approach you about it.”

“Yeah,” Dean wiped his palms on his jeans once, twice, then again. “You’re right Cas.”

Castiel stood and rested a hand on Dean’s shoulder, the firm weight anchoring and reassuring him. 

“I understand that our actions were influenced by otherworldly means. Though my Father doesn’t care about sexual orientation, I see that you are ashamed that you partook in such actions with me”

“It’s not you, Cas--”

The door to the bathroom opened and Dean clamped his mouth shut, freezing behind the open door as steam poured out.

“Where’s Dean?”

“Waiting for you to finish your morning beauty regimen, Sasquatch. Now if you’re done braiding your hair, I’d like to shower.”

Dean shut the door with what could have been a slam and clicked the lock. On the other side of the door he heard his brother ask,

“What’s with him?”

He didn’t wait to hear Castiel’s answer and instead turned on the shower and shucked off his clothes.

 

“Forty seven women,” Michaela said flatly, skimming the list. Across from her, Dean was shovelling waffles into his mouth like it was his job and Sam was picking strawberries from his bowl of fruit salad and mixing them into his oatmeal. 

“I can verify they are all still alive.”

Castel stared into space, seemingly frozen. After about thirty seconds, he blinked.

“I have searched the area and found forty-seven pregnant women alive within the borders of this base. Four are in a medical facility, two in a waiting room, one in with a doctor, one is a doctor, and the final one is unconscious in a bed and is hooked up to several machines.”

“We’ll need to start with her.”

Sam nodded and Dean grunted through a mouthful of waffle.

“We should connect with Ashley and Lacey, see if one of them has an in before we try to walk into a military hospital.”

Dean snorted and Michaela shot him a disgusted look. He swallowed the last mouthful of waffle.

“We’ve got an angel with us. He can fly us in.”

“I’m sure he can, but if a nurse sees us in the room and we’re not on the security tapes, that’s a problem.”

“He can erase memories too.”

“I’m not saying he’s incapable, I’m saying it might be smarter to go the more traditional route in this case.”  
“Listen, we’ve been doing this a long time, sweetheart.”

“Oh? I had no idea. Tell me more about how your vast experience compares to mine.”

“I’ve killed things tougher than you.”

“Somehow I doubt that.”

“Guys!” Sam half-shouted and both parties shut up.

“While you guys were bickering, I texted Lacey. She said Ashley has some visitor’s passes we can use if we get stopped, but that we should be fine to visit.”

“Great. Let’s go visiting.”


	3. For Just One Yesterday (I Know I'm Bad News)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team visits a victim, looks for a monster, and Dean and Cas have internal frustrations about each other.

They arrived on Mrs. Ocampo’s hospital floor carrying a somewhat wilted bouquet of flowers from the hospital’s gift shop as well as a teddy bear holding a heart that said ‘get well soon’.  Sam had insisted that a party of four was more noticeable than two people but both Michaela and Dean insisted they go and Sam didn’t feel comfortable leaving the two of them alone together just now. The bickering at the breakfast table had turned into a lingering bad mood and he didn’t want to have to explain the damage if they decided to throw down in a hospital. He didn’t think Dean or Michaela would actually get into a physical fight, but they both seemed to be a little more snippy. 

Mrs. Ocampo’s photo from her file was of a woman in a military uniform with warm brown skin and black hair pinned back into a neat bun. The woman on the bed was different; her skin seemed paler, like too much water added to a color palette. Her hair lacked luster and her lips were dry. Michaela laid the bouquet on the dresser next to the other offerings and Castiel awkwardly deposited the bear at the foot of her bed. While Michaela pulled a chair up next to the unconscious woman, the picture of a concerned friend, Sam skimmed over her charts, taking a few pictures on his phone.

“What’s her chart say?”

“Hypovolemia.”

“In English, Samantha.”

“Blood loss.”

Michaela looked up.

“She’s doesn’t look like she’s got any cuts or wounds.”

“There’s a deep puncture wound on her thigh.”

“Did someone stab her?”

“The doctor thinks so.”

“Maybe not a monster then.”

“It was a centimeter in diameter.”

“A screwdriver maybe?” Dean suggested. “Does it say if they filed a police report?”

“No but I’d be willing to bet that they did.”

“They must have hit an artery,” Sam mused.

A horrendous digitized version of something bubblegum pop blared from Michaela’s pocket and she fumbled with it before answering her phone.

“Hello? Where the hell have you been? I’m already here!”

Cas motioned to Dean.

“I can heal her.”

“I know, but we should probably get out of here before you do. Once she wakes up, the room will be full of nurses asking questions.”

“I can heal her without waking her up, Dean.”

“So they just arrested him?” Michaela asked whoever she was on the phone with. “If he didn’t have a weapon, how would he stab her?”

Dan looked up as she continued.

“No, you’re right. Yes, I can meet you.”

He cleared his throat pointedly and she held up a finger at him, signalling ‘wait’ before nodding a few times.

“Yes. No, I can get copies. I’ll tell you in an hour.”

As she hung up, Dean thrust his hands into his pockets in a forced show of casual disinterest.

“Leaving us to meet up with a buddy?”

“That was my contact who was supposed to get us in.”

“And?”

“Apparently he’s looking into the arrest of Mr. Ocampo. He wasn’t found with a weapon, but called 911 for his wife and was arrested on the scene for attempted murder.”

“What?”

“He’s been getting treatment for PTSD and they suspect he attacked his wife unknowingly.”

“He called 911.”

“I don’t have all the details. I’m supposed to meet my contact at one to exchange some information.”

“And we’re supposed to, what? Wait for you?” Dean asked.

“There is an entire list of pregnant women to look into. I’m not suggesting you sit around on your asses waiting for me.”

“You’ll just go to a secret meeting with your secret contact without us.”

“It’s my contact and the Winchesters have a reputation. I don’t want you barging in and scaring them off.”

“What us?” Dean attempted to look innocent and failed miserably.

“Back from hell and the dead, apocalypse-causing, deity-irritating…” Michaela ticked off their offenses on her fingers

“Yes. You have a reputation.”

“And what, we’re going to scare off some poor hunter?”

“Look.” Michaela shifted her weight, tugged at the hem of her shirt. “I’m beginning to trust you to cover my back and not kill me in my sleep. But you always seem tangled in something big and dangerous and everyone you know gets dragged into it. I’m keeping my contact out of it so the next time there’s an apocalypse or Cthulhu rises from the depths, they don’t get pulled in.”

Dean looked like he wanted to argue but Sam nodded.

“We get it. We’ll go through the list. Just call when you’re done and we can meet up.”

After dialing Sam’s number into her cell phone, she nodded.

“Okay. Good luck out there.”

“You too.”

 

They met a grim-faced Michaela about two hours later.

“They can’t find the weapon but I got a copy of the case file.” She handed Sam a beige file folder which he flipped through. As he did, she kept talking.

“They’re still looking for the weapon which should buy us time, but this is a military police investigation and we don’t want to get caught poking around in it. My contact has secured an interview with Mr. Ocampo.”

“And?”

“And they’ll going to get the man’s story and pass it on.”

“Get his story? Does he-she-whoever even know what to ask?”

“You’re not the only hunters in the world. Yes. They know what to ask. Did you come up with anything?”

“Not from the search, but I did notice something,” Sam cut in. “All the victims have been Filipino women.”

“What?”

“The dead pregnant women and Mrs. Ocampo are all from the Philippines originally.”

“Is that relevant?”

“It might be. We’ve been looking at monsters we’re already familiar with. I was going to go and read up on Filipino monsters while you, Cas, and Dean keep working on the list.”

Michaela hesitated before nodding.

“Fine.”

“When is your friend talking to Mr. Ocampo?”

Michaela looked at her watch.

“Within the hour.”

“All right, I guess we’ll regroup around dinner?”

Michaela shrugged. Dean nodded.

“Before I forget,” Michaela said, “Military wives talk to each other. A lot. So keep the story straight.”

“We’re not newbies.”

“All right. Go team, I guess.”

“Go team,” Castiel echoed softly.

  
  


While Sam retreated to the library and Michaela met her contact, Cas and Dean went through the list. Despite the fact that they had plenty of time to talk between houses, it was silent, almost oppressively so. Even Cas, who was comfortable with silence, could feel the tension in the air, thickening the longer words went unspoken. Dean had made it quite clear that he wasn’t comfortable with what they had shared, nor did he have any interest in discussing it. So Cas, the loyal soldier, didn’t mention it, though it was a weight that rested heavy on his chest. Human emotions used to be foreign to him but even angels felt shame. Yes, shame was something he was already familiar with.

More houses, more pleasant lies told for the protection of the ignorant. Dean’s feet were beginning to ache and though he occasionally shot a glance at Cas to make sure he was still there, he avoided looking at him, talking to him.

What was he supposed to say, anyway?  _ No Cas, it’s not you I objected to it was the fact that I was basically drugged into it. No Cas, I have no problem with the idea of jacking off while you watch, hell I’d like you to participate, it’s just weird that this is how it happened. Cas, we’re friends and friends don’t look at each other’s dicks. It’s a human thing.  _ _ Watching you was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen and damn if I can’t stop thinking about it.  _ _ No, that wasn’t it.  _ Hallmark didn’t make a “sorry I got magicked into leading you on” card. And it was doubtful that angels understood balloon bouquets, though the thought of Cas receiving one made him smile to himself. Eight more names on the list. Nearly four o’clock. 

His phone rang and he picked it up without looking.

“What?”

“I think I know what it is.”

“What is it?”

“It’s called an Aswang. It’s a Filipino monster that drinks human blood and eats unborn fetuses. They have a long, proboscis-like tongue that they use to suck blood. That could easily be the puncture wound on Mrs. Ocampo’s leg.”

“How do we kill it?”

“I’ve got some mixed information but it looks like we have to destroy the heart.”

“Destroy like stab? Burn? Help me out here, Sammy.”

“It just says destroy.”

“Well if we cut it out and burn it, that’s pretty destroyed. Let’s go with that. Anything else?”

“They look like humans during the day. Quiet, shy, usually work around meat. Look for a butcher.”

“They got a butcher on base?”

“I’m not seeing one, but there’s one about five miles outside of town.”

“We’re on it.”

“It closes at five. Come pick me up?”

“Me and Cas’ll scope it out. See if you can find out how to kill it for sure.”

“Dean, what about--”

Dean hit ‘end’ and pocketed the cell phone, looking over to the passenger seat at Castiel.

“Ready to go on a stakeout?”

The angel shrugged and Dean put the car into reverse, pulling a 3-point turn and heading the way they had come. As he pulled onto a main road, he flipped on the radio and remembered abruptly that Cas had fried it so he jammed a cassette into the slot. Miraculously, it played and Dean’s face made an expression between a smile and a grimace. Good enough for now. 


	4. For Just One Yesterday (I Saved It All For You)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Winchesters, Cas, and Michaela find a monster.

“You have your badge?” Dean asked gruffly as he pulled into a parking space in front of the butcher’s shop.

Reaching into the breast pocket of his coat, Castiel produced a leather folded wallet, flashing the badge at Dean, who nodded, then paused and took the badge from Cas’s hand.

“Agent Aguilera?”

“You and Sam use musicians as aliases.”

“Not current musicians, Cas. And not women...Sam and I can’t pass for women and neither can you.”

“It’s the only badge I have, Dean.”

Dean muttered something that sounded like “unbelievable” and got out of the car, popping the trunk as he did. He rifled through the trunk until he found the box of badges he and Sam used and dug through them until he found one with Castiel’s face on it. The black print read ‘health inspector’.

“Here.” He thrust the badge at Cas, who accepted it without comment.

“Just follow my lead, okay?”

“Dean, I’ve done this without you before.”

“Carrying around a badge that said ‘Aguilera’ on it, so excuse me if I don’t immediately trust your expertise.”

Cas scowled and held his tongue as he followed Dean into the butcher shop. 

It was cool, almost chilly inside with air that smelled faintly of blood. Behind a sheet of glass, various meats were displayed on ice-crusted trays and behind the counter, a woman with dark hair bunched under a hairnet fed chunks of meat into a hand-cranked grinder, the ground meat coiling onto a styrofoam tray. She looked up as the bell on the door rang and smiled.

“With you in a minute.”

“Take your time,” Dean said, leaning in to inspect the meats on display. There was a set of t-bone steaks wrapped in bacon that he paid particular attention, wishing that military guest quarters came with a grill. Hell even an oven...you could broil a steak. The woman wrapped the styrofoam tray and placed it on a scale, printing a sticker and sticking it to the plastic wrap. She set the tray among a score of others on ice in the display window and peeled off her gloves.

“How can I help you?”

Dean pulled out his badge and smiled.

“Surprise health inspection.”

The woman looked confused.

“We got inspected last month and had a clean bill.”

“Well we’ve had a lot of places clean up for the inspection and then not maintain that level of cleanliness so we’ve started making spot-checks. Are you the owner or the manager?”

“I’m the assistant manager,” she offered and Dean smiled.

“Good enough for us. We just want to take a look at your prep area, your freezer, and where you receive shipments.”

“Of course, come on back. Should I call my manager?”

“No, that’s fine. This will only take a minute and if everything matches your original inspection, we’ll be out of your hair. Which by the way, nice hairnet.”

Dean offered the woman a charming smile which she returned hesitantly.

“My partner here will examine the prep area if you’ll just show me the freezer. Ten minutes tops.”

“Of course, whatever you need.”

Dean followed her lead to the enormous walk-in freezer where racks of beef and pork hung on great metal hooks. He walked around, looking everything up and down.

“Is the poultry stored separately?”

“No, we’re just out tonight. There’s a chicken cook-off happening this weekend and the customers cleared us out.”

“Oh yeah?”

“You can even come if you promise not to give the competition any citations.”

Chuckling, Dean shook his head.

“I wouldn’t shut down a good old-fashioned cook-off.”

“Just a humble butcher’s?”

“It all looks fine in here; everything’s clean and the temperature’s right. I bet my partner’s nearly done too, we’ll be on our way in no time.”

“Just let me lock the freezer and I’ll catch up.”

“Can-do.”

Out in the prep area, Castiel inspected the meat grinder with unwavering focus, looking up as Dean walked in.

“Everything look good in here?”

Cas nodded.

“Excellent, then let’s get out of this young lady’s hair.”

As her footsteps approached from behind, he turned to offer a smile and inform her that the spot-check had passed. Instead, there was a crackle of energy in the air as the assistant manager of the butcher pressed her bloody palm to a sigil drawn on the tile walls. As Cas flickered out of existence with a surprised look, Dean felt a sharp pain in his head before everything went black.

  
  


Sam was poring over a reference book about the history and culture of the Philippines when his phone vibrated against his thigh. A woman at the next table looked up at him disapprovingly as Sam answered in a low voice.

“Yeah?”

“Mr. Ocampo says he saw something with a long straw sucking his wife’s blood which sounds like a weird vampire thing but--”

“No, that fits with what I’ve been reading. Dean and Cas went to the butcher’s off base to check it out.”

“And?”

Sam looked at his watch.

“They should be done by now. Let me call him.”

“Are you back at the hotel?”

“No, library.”

“Need a ride?”

“Sure, I’ll have Dean pick up dinner on the way back.”

Sam hung up, punched in his brother’s number, and waited.

The phone rang, then rang again. It kept ringing until Dean’s voice cut in.

_ This is Dean. If it’s an emergency, leave a message.  _

“Damnit Dean,” Sam muttered and hung up. He redialed, much to the irritation of the woman at the next table over. She glared at him intently before returning her attention to her book.

Dean didn’t pick up on the second or third call so Sam dialed Cas’s number instead. After three rings, the angel answered.

“Sam?”

“Cas, are you and Dean okay?”

“I am fine, though a bit disoriented. And in the middle of a desert. The woman at the butcher shop drew an angel-banishing sigil.”

Sam closed up his laptop and tucked it into his bag, then pulling in a pile of papers he had printed and scribbled on. The book he tucked under one arm as he rushed over to the desk where a librarian was offering a middle-aged woman her opinion on the new thriller series. He made brief eye contact, set the book down, and half-ran out the door, phone tucked between his ear and his shoulder.

“Cas I’m outside of the library, corner of Adams Drive and Eisenhower Avenue. Can you fly?”

There was the sound of something landing in the shrubs behind Sam and Cas stood, shaking his head as he climbed out of the bushes.

“Yes,” the angel said. “Though I am still a bit disoriented.”

Sam hung up and redialed Michaela. The phone rang several times and then her voicemail message played.

_ Michaela’s cell, leave a message and a number. _

Sam hung up and tried again. When she didn’t answer a second time, Sam looked over at Cas who was currently picking twigs out of his hair.

“She’s not answering.”

“She wasn’t at the butcher,” Castiel said. “It is unlikely that she is also under attack.”

As he finished the sentence, Michaela pulled up to the curb, leaning out her window. Sam almost didn’t recognize her because the car she was driving looked like a early 2000s Toyota instead of the piece of garbage she had magicked it to look like. 

“What?” she called out of the window and Sam jogged over to the car, yanking open the passenger door and climbing in.

“You weren’t picking up your phone.”

“This is a military base. You can’t talk on your phone while driving, they’ll pull you over. What is it?”

Castiel fumbled with the door before sliding into the back seat.

“The creature has Dean.”

“What?”

“It banished me with a sigil...I think there was some other kind of magic in it...I do not feel entirely myself.”

“You look kind of hammered,” Michaela offered and Castiel shook his head, wincing as he did so.

“I have been inebriated and this is much more unpleasant.”

“You’ve been--”

“Not now,” Sam interrupted. “We need to get to that butcher shop.”

“Just tell me where to go.”

Michaela didn’t exactly tear out of the parking lot, but she did go as fast as she could get away with without getting pulled over.


	5. I Want to Teach You a Lesson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Find Dean, kill the monster, save the base. There's only one thing to do in a situation like this.

When Dean woke up he was cold. This wasn’t uncommon really, he moved around in his sleep and often kicked off his blankets but it was uncommon for him to wake up lying on the floor of a meat freezer. A moment after he became aware that he was cold, the pain in his head made him reach up to touch the area. Gently prodding it made him wince and swear under his breath. No blood as far as he could tell but he would have a goose egg and several weeks of colorful bruising. 

“Shit,” he muttered as he sat up, his muscles stiff with cold. Between the cold, the bruise, and the stiffness he felt very acutely that he was no longer a 25-year old, no matter how much he drank like one. It was also pretty damn dark. There was the red bulb of the mandatory emergency light but other than that, shadows reigned. Dean checked his pockets--pants, jacket, even the small of his back where he often kept a gun. All empty. Even his wallet and the stick of cinnamon gum were gone.

“Why is it always a freezer?” Dean growled as he stomped his feet, hoping to get his blood moving. “You’d think that crazy people would go for basements or abandoned buildings or those weird torture rooms but no. Freezers.” 

Unfortunately, no one responded to his mutters. He was alone.

 

As Michaela pulled into the parking lot next to the black Chevy Impala, Sam burst out, one hand on his gun. Castiel, still looking woozy, let his angel blade slide from his sleeve and into his palm. 

“You have to destroy the heart,” Sam said.

Michaela pulled a knife from the sheath at her ankle and nodded.

“Let’s go.”

The door was locked but it was glass. Sam gave it a few kicks but it bounced off. When he stepped back to try again, Michaela put an arm out to stop him. She pulled back her arm and punched, the glass shattering around her arm.

“Nephilim perks,” she said in response to Sam’s surprised look. “I’ve got grace to to back me up.”

Reaching through the hole, she unlocked the door and pushed it open. The lights were off except for the emergency light glowing in one corner and it smelled of antiseptic and cleaning fluid.

“I don’t know if it’s still here,” Sam muttered. “Watch my back.”

“What about him?” Michaela asked, jabbing her thumb in the direction of Cas. “That spell knocked him sideways.”

“Cas, watch my back,” Sam whisper-shouted and Michaela shrugged, following behind. They moved through the open area, then behind the counter, and back into the hall. The bathrooms and break room were empty and the meat freezer was padlocked shut. Michaela reached forward and gave it a one-handed yank, snapping the metal pieces apart. Sam looked less startled but still a bit uneasy. Instead of remarking on this, Michaela threw open the door. She leaned in to look and before she had a chance to call Dean’s name, she was on the floor, having been tackled, both arms pinned to the ground. Her head cracked on the metal floor but still she rolled, trying to pin her attacker underneath her. As she rolled she got an arm free and jabbed to punch her opponent in the chin. There was shouting in the background but Michaela was busy trying not to get pinned again. As she pulled her knee up to give the guy a blow to the crotch, she was bodily torn from her opponent and tossed at the wall like a rag doll. Woozily, she tried to get up, blinking rapidly to hopefully clear her vision.

“Michaela! Stop, it’s Dean!”

Her eyes focused on Dean, currently rubbing his jaw and sitting up while Castiel stood beside him, angel blade in his palm and blue eyes blazing. If she squinted a little, she could see the dark wings undetectable to the human eye that spread wide, daring her to come closer.

“Dean didn’t toss me against a wall,” she mumbled, tentatively checking her head for bumps or bleeding. There was a mild pounding headache but her grace would sort that out soon enough. Her split knuckles from catching Dean’s teeth were already beginning to close up.

“No,” Sam agreed, shooting a look at the angel. Though he couldn’t see Castiel’s wings, the angel’s protective stance was one that dared someone to attack, a warrior’s pose.

“Dean, could you?” Sam asked tersely and Dean waved a hand.

“I’m fine, Cas. Thought she was that monster chick coming back to finish the job.”

Castiel relaxed somewhat, but stayed beside the hunter as Dean shook his head and spat onto the floor, his saliva bloody.

“I think you knocked one of my teeth crooked,” he accused and Michaela shrugged.

“You tackled me. You’re lucky that my policy is to pin before I ask questions or kill or you’d have a broken neck.”

Dean shook his head again, this time half-smiling.

“Takes a lot more than one lousy nephil to kill me.”

Michaela used the wall to help herself stand. She could feel her grace healing all the bruises from their scuffle and steadied herself while it did the rest of its work. Castiel pressed two fingers to Dean’s forehead and the other man stood easily, putting one hand to his mouth as his tooth moved back into place.

“She’s got my wallet, my phone, my gun, my knife, everything.”

“Well at least finding her should be easy,” Sam remarked.

“Don’t tell me you put that tracking shit back on my phone, Sammy.”

“Stop getting into trouble and I won’t need it anymore.”

“I told you to take that shit off, it’s weird! I don’t want you following me around!”

Sam shrugged and opened an app on his phone.

“I’m fine by the way,” Michaela remarked dryly. “Thanks for asking.”

“You heal like angels do,” Castiel said. “There was no need for concern.”

She bit her tongue to keep from snapping back something rude and instead turned her attention to Sam.

“Got anything?”

“She either turned his phone off, tossed it, or both. I got nothing.”

“Should have put one of those radio trackers on it,” she said and Dean shot her a look.

“Don’t give him ideas. She didn’t take Baby, did she?”

“No Dean, your car is in the parking lot.” The angel sounded more lucid than he had a few minutes ago and Sam glanced over at him.

“You sound better.”

“What did he sound like before?” Dean asked tersely and Sam explained Cas’s previous somewhat woozy state.

“All the hangover with none of the fun of drinking, huh?”

“We have somewhat different ideas of fun,” the angel replied in his usual low monotone. 

“So how are we going to find it?” Michaela asked. “We can’t track it magically unless we have something that was strongly linked to it and I doubt any of the meats were overly attached. She also probably didn’t have a coffee mug which says “World’s Cutest Monster”. 

“Well there’s the tried and true Scooby Doo method,” Sam said and the other three members of the team turned to look at him, two faces confused and the third irritated.

“Sammy I swear if you say what I think you’re going to say.”

Sam smirked at his brother and said,

“We should split up.”

 

“We should split up,” Dean muttered mockingly under his breath as he sat on the stone picnic table at one of the base’s public parks. “Has he ever seen an episode of Scooby Doo? Him and Michaela are going to get into some kind of trouble and then we’re going to have to save their sorry asses. Dumbass moose.”

“Scooby Doo is a television program?”

“I swear Cas, you’ve seen porn and not cartoons?”  
“I have seen cartoons. The mouse and the cat and the existential dilemma of mortality and human existence.”

Dean left that remark entirely alone--he wasn’t going to start talking philosophy with a being which had seen fish grow legs and wriggle from the sea. Especially if that particular being was Cas. He also didn’t want to have to ask Sam or Cas what the hell existentialism was. Instead, he grunted and gave a sort of half-nod. 

“I don’t think you’re allowed to do that,” Cas said, indicating the move Dean had just made on the chessboard that they were using as their cover. The park was smack in the middle of a neighborhood which three of the pregnant women on their list lived in. Sam and Michaela were driving around in Michaela’s car keeping an eye out, but this park was within sight of three houses at once--better odds than repeated drive-bys.

“We’re not really playing chess, Cas.”

“If we’re supposed to be convincingly spending a late afternoon in a public park, should we not follow the rules of the game?”

Dean sighed, exasperated.

“Whatever you want, Cas.”

The angel’s facial expression was suddenly concerned for a moment, then back to its usual neutral; Dean might not have spotted it if he hadn’t been looking at Cas already. 

“What?” he lowered his voice, glanced to either side of him. “Do you see something?”

“No.”

“What’s with the face then?”

“It came with the vessel,” Castiel responded and Dean had to keep his mouth from falling open in surprise. The angel understood sarcasm but used it significantly less than the Winchester boys. A perfectly-timed remark was a rarity and Cas had fucking nailed it. If Cas noticed Dean’s surprise, he didn’t show it. He instead moved Dean’s chess piece--a knight--back to its original position.

“Knights move two squared up, one over.”

Dean pulled a face that was eerily similar to Sam’s ‘bitch face’ and moved the piece in an ‘L’ shape. Cas took the piece with his pawn and set Dean’s knight on the side of the board alongside a pile of other black pieces. 

“Why couldn’t we play checkers?”

“The gas station had a portable chess set, not a portable checkers set.”

“We could use coins.”

“You’re just bad at chess.”

Dean looked around again instead of snapping back at the angel. Seeing nothing, he returned his attention to the gameboard.

“We’ve only got an hour or so left of daylight before playing chess in the park won’t make sense.”

“What activities do people do in public parks at night?”

“Most of them involve being at least partially naked and I really don’t want to get the cops called on us.”

“I was unaware public nudism was popular again. The Greeks were much more lax about it than the current humans are.”

“No, it’s not popular. Which is why we’d get the police called. People don’t like it when they find other people boning in their neighborhood park. Especially if you’re a teenager.”

Dean offered a wry grin.

“Especially if you’re a teenager and your partner in crime is a cop’s daughter.”

“I am no one’s daughter,” Castiel observed as he moved his rook to sit a few squares away from Dean’s king. “Check.”

“I’m not having--check?”

“Your king is in peril. If I’d said checkmate then I’d have already won.”

Dean moved his king up a row.

“Who invented this game anyway? Weird rules, weird names for things. We could have played poker.”

“A young woman in what is now Pakistan.”

“What?”

“A young woman in what is now deemed ‘Pakistan’ invented chess. At least in its more original form. The rules have become more standardized since then. Humans eliminated a few things I enjoyed from it but the garrison always played by current human rules. It grew rather confusing between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries.”

“Your garrison played chess?”

“It’s a strategy exercise. Understanding the power of tll the pieces in your army and using them against your opponent is a simplified way to battle.”

“So you’ve been playing chess for…” Dean counted on his fingers, “Eight hundred years?”

“About one thousand four hundred, but not constantly.”

Dean looked at the board and back up at the angel sitting across from him.

“You’re going easy on me.”

Castiel looked embarrassed momentarily and then nodded.

“This is the third or fourth time you’ve played. It would have been unfair to play otherwise.”

“You think you can beat me?”

Cas met his eyes and stared in that somewhat unsettling way that he had. Without looking he moved one of his pieces.

“Checkmate.”

“Asshole.”

The light grew dimmer until it was too dark to play chess any more, which was fine by Dean, who had been trounced a half-dozen more times at the game. They sat in his car after that, mostly in silence. 

“I thought you said sitting in a car was conspicuous.”

“It’s less conspicuous than sitting at a park in the dark.”

“Human social norms are confusing.”

“You’ve been studying us for millions of years.”

“They change often and vary on location.”

“We’re that different from angels?”

“You only see angels in vessels. Our true forms are enormous and made of light and celestial intent. We don’t speak in the same way you do. We don’t have all of these strange rules about what can and cannot be done and when, with the rules changing based upon the weather and the age and gender of the human. Angels don’t have gender. There’s no reason to. And human interpretation of gender is confusing enough without having certain rules paired in context with it.”

Dean opened his mouth to say something but nothing came to mind except.

“That’s rough, dude.”

Cas, surprisingly, seemed to accept this as a response and nodded.

They sat in silence again until Dean cleared his throat uncomfortably. 

“If angels don’t have gender, how do you guys...you know...cloud seed?”

“What does that have to do with gender?” Cas asked, sounding puzzled.

“Um...everything? Sex...like regular sex...requires some specific parts.”

“What part of light and celestial intent do you not grasp? Angels don’t have genitals in the way that you understand them. I do understand your confusion, however. You have only encountered angels in this form,” the angel gestured at his vessel. “If you were to see me in my true form, your eyes would be burned out.”

“So lights off during sex then?”

“It doesn’t work...for angels to copulate in a way that you understand you’d have to have a grasp of quantum mechanics that the human mind might not be able to entirely comprehend.”

“Our way sounds more fun,” Dean remarked.

“The human way is very...physical.” 

In the dark it was impossible to tell if Castiel was blushing, but his tone implied embarrassment.

“Not all of us are made of colossal deviance or whatever.”

“Celestial intent,” Castiel corrected.

“Whatever. Point is, it matters when you’re a human.The pieces fit together differently.”

“Genitals vary so widely, it always astonished me that as human progress went on, your number of genders shrunk. You’re only left with two now, which I suppose is easy to remember but there used to be at least five or six.”

“Five or six...you know what? I don’t want to know.”

“Gabriel in particular found it fascinating, but he was always the troublesome one of us.”

“I’m sure.”

“I take it that you recall some of his more--”

“Shhh,” Dean hissed suddenly. “There’s something outside the Johnson house.”

Both men turned their attention to the figure currently walking around the side of the house towards the front. As the yellow of the porch light washed over the figure, a black man in a grey shirt with ‘ARMY’ written in black on the chest and a pair of black running shorts. He looked tired and after circling the house again, he disappeared.

“Can Aswang shapeshift?”

“I am not familiar with the creatures. However, that man is Sergeant Johnson. He lives there.”

“How do you know?”

Cas reached for something on the floor of the car and pulled out several manilla file folders. He opened one and showed Dean the photos clipped inside. The man they had seen circling the house was in one of them, a child with his smile riding on his shoulders while he wrapped his free arm around the waist of a woman. The photo in question was a birth announcement, the text underneath revealing a due date only a few weeks away.

“It was in the file, Dean.”

“You read the files?”

“Is that not the point of them?”

“Well technically yes, but usually Sam takes care of that sort of thing.”

“Sam does seem to prefer research.”

“Yeah, the nerd.”

Mr. Johnson went back inside his house and Dean called Sam.

The phone connected and Dean started talking without waiting for so much as a ‘hello’.

“Sammy, do you know if these things can shapeshift?”

There was silence on the end of the line for a moment, then it went dead.

Dean was about to call back when a text appeared on his screen. Michaela. It was an address and a command:  _ Bring a bag of salt. A big bag. _


	6. In The Worst Kind of Way

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Before you kill a monster, you have to catch it. Before you catch a monster, you have to find it. Bring the salt.

Gas station purchases were a Winchester staple--you could get pretty much anything you needed from a gas station. Unless of course you were in the California desert and you were looking for a five-pound bag of rock salt. Dean swore under his breath and grabbed a cylinder of table salt.

“Cas, grab as many of these as you can carry.” He paused, realizing that Cas could probably carry half the store. “Grab ten or so.”

The store clerk didn’t even blink when Dean paid for the salt. She didn’t ask questions, she barely looked up other than to point at the card reader.

“It doesn’t take a chip.”

“That’s fine.”

They were back in the Impala within 5 minutes and already headed to the address. It was a house, dark with a crappy car parked outside.

“There’s only one car that ugly,” Dean muttered, and got out. Cas followed suit, stuffing as many of the salt containers into the pockets of his trenchcoat and carrying the rest in his hands.

“Dean, if you could take some of these, I can’t get to my angel blade without dropping half of them.”

Dean grabbed a couple and shoved them into the pockets of his jacket where they bounced against his sides.

“Could you two make any more noise?” Michaela whispered from behind the bushes.

Dean jumped a little.

“Shit, could you be more creepy? Skulking in the bushes, geez. Where’s Sam?”

“Other side of the house.”

“And the salt?”

“Sam said it doesn’t like salt.”

“What does? Cas, give her a couple.”

The angel tossed his niece two containers of salt, which she caught and placed on the ground next to her.

“I’m covering the front, Sam’s on the back. We saw something go in the window upstairs but the only thing we’ve got is shotguns full of rock salt and with eight windows, this thing could get out and we couldn’t cover all of the exits. We were going to go in when you got here.”

“Well we’re here.”

“Then let’s do this.”

Dean motioned to Cas.

“Come on, we’ll take the back with Sam.”

Castiel paused for a moment.

“We’re leaving Michaela alone?”

“Nephilim have twice the power of the angel that they’re descended from,” Michaela said. “I’ll be fine.”

“Your father is an archangel,” Dean said slowly and then shook his head. “We’re talking about this later.”

“Kill the monster first, talk about my family tree later.”

Dean hesitated but walked around to the back of the house where his brother waited. A moment later, her phone buzzed in her pocket and she drove her shoulder into the front door, forcing it open. She poured a little salt in a line behind her and stepped over the threshold. From the other side of the house, she could hear the Winchesters’ boots on the floor. She couldn’t hear Castiel’s but she didn’t think much of that. He could be quiet.

They met at the base of the stairs.

“Ground floor is clear.”

Dean nodded and went up first, his brother behind him. Castiel followed and Michaela drew another line of salt on the stairs before stepping over it and climbing after them. It was quiet in the house except for the shuffling of feet and Michaela stopped, tapping Castiel’s shoulder. When he looked, she gestured at the Winchesters. He tapped Sam’s shoulder, Sam tapped Dean’s. When they were all looking back at her, she tugged on her earlobe.

“What?” Dean mouthed.

“Listen,” Michaela said softly.

Sam froze and Dean looked from his brother to Michela.

“What?” he whispered.

“Do you hear any breathing? Whoever is in there is holding their breath."

Dean pointed to each of them, then a door, and held up his fingers. Three, two, one.

All four of them pushed open doors and a shot was fired. Glass broke and around the neighborhood, lights began to turn on. Down the street, blue and white lights began to flash.

A woman screamed.

“Hey hey hey, we’re the good guys,” Dean’s voice was clear. Michaela rolled her eyes.

“I swear, men are useless.”

She rushed into the bedroom where Dean and the woman were. She was sweating and bleeding from a small wound in her abdomen.

“Go catch it,” Michaela snapped and knelt down on the floor next to the woman’s bed. When Dean hesitated, she raised her voice.

“Winchester, go!”

The woman was babbling, hand pressed over the bleeding wound.

“There was a thing, a thing was in my room, a thing, oh God my baby.”

“I know, I know.”

She took a sock from the floor and shoved it into the woman’s hand as a siren blared down the street.

“Listen, we’re going to get you to the hospital. The men are out of your house but the police are going to come in and they’re going to ask questions. You have a broken window, there was a shot. Your husband is deployed, right?”

She nodded, still pressing the sock to her belly.

“Where does he keep his gun?”

“Drawer,” she gestured at the table on the other side of the bed and Michaela bounded over the bed, drew the gun from the drawer, ejected the magazine, and closed it again.

“Half the bullets are missing.”

The woman nodded and tried to pull herself into a sitting position.

“Hospital, okay.”

Together, they got the pregnant woman to her feet and they began down the hall, down the stairs. They were at the bottom of the stairs when the police came into the house.

“Military Police,” one barked at the women.

“She’s pregnant, we need to get to a hospital.”

“What happened?”

“We need to get to the hospital.”

“We’ve got an ambulance on the way, ma’am. What happened?”

The woman looked to Michaela, who nodded.

“There was a monster...it was…” she swallowed, looking ill.

“I came in when I heard the gunshot,” Michaela said. “The window was broken, she was holding the gun so I took it from her.”

“And the monster?”

“Listen, she’s pregnant, she had a nightmare, she woke up. When is the ambulance getting here?”

“It’s on it’s way ma’am. How are you related to Mrs. Carter?”

“We were roommates in college.”

Michaela fielded what seemed like a hundred questions before the ambulance arrived, and when it did, she helped Mrs. Carter onto the stretcher.

“I’ll follow in my car, okay? So we can get home afterwards?”

She rushed to her car and got in, turned the key, and drove after the ambulance for a few blocks until she saw the tail-lights of a Chevy Impala headed east and hooked a right turn to follow after it, pulling her phone out as she did.

“Little busy,” Sam said in lieu of a ‘hello’.

“I’m behind you. Are you following it?”

“It keeps moving, but it’s not staying above the roads.”

“It wouldn’t.”

“Sunlight burns them, but sunrise isn’t for another eight hours.”

“It’s heading east right now, but there’s a dozen buildings on this base and the road is going to turn. We need a backup plan. We can’t drive around like this for long, we’re attracting suspscion.”

“Michaela, I’m putting you on speaker so Dean and Cas can hear too. We need to think this through. It’s got to have a place to hide or a vehicle near the house. It’s got to go back there before sunrise, that’s where we need to go.”

“Okay, so stop the chase and sweep the area,” Dean said. “Got it. How big an area are we talking?”

“How far can this thing fly?”

“I don’t know, it’s bigger than most birds and it probably doesn’t have hollow bones like most avians do...:”

“Sammy, cut the lecture short.”

“If it walked at human speed, less than a mile, add flight and...three mile radius maybe?”

Dean cleared his throat and spoke a moment later.

“Okay, it’s not going to be right next to the house or the police would have taken a look already. We’ll check the streets around it. If it’s a car it has tinted windows.”

Michaela nodded and stopped at a stop sign, looked around, and pulled a U-turn.

“There has to be a car, she couldn’t have gotten around in the daytime without one. Busses don’t have the kinds of window tinting she’d need to keep from burning. I’ll check the north and east if you take the south and west.”

“Got it. Call when you find the car.”

“Will do.”

She hung up and began driving back and forth through the neighborhood, scanning for a car with tinted windows. The warding on her car made it difficult to remember in the same way that it made it made it unappealing to look at; people’s eyes slid over it in the same way they did things they didn’t want to look at. There was a sedan with tinted windows, a police car. The next one was an SUV, clearly meant for off-roading. She was beginning to lost hope when her phone vibrated in her pocket.

“Hello?”

“We think we found it. All the windows are tinted, even the rear windshield. We wouldn’t have seen it, it had some kind of magic on it like your car does, but Cas saw through it.”

“You have to ward against angels specifically, they’re not usually in the cover-all. Where are you?”

“Three blocks south of the house, about halfway down the street.”

“Got it. And Sam?”

“What?”

“Don’t open it up without me; if it’s warded already, she might have put something nasty on it as a safety measure.”

“I think Cas can handle it, but okay.”

In the background, Dean’s voice asked what Cas could handle, but Michaela hung up before she could hear any more. It was monster-killing time.


	7. Still I'd Trade All My Tomorrows for Just One Yesterday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Let's wrap this case up, shall we?

The car was an older model SUV, painted dark green with tinted windows. The Impala was parked next to it and Sam and Dean leaned against one side of the car with Cas leaning against the other. Looking at the SUV for more than a moment gave her a headache.

“Shit, she put something good on it.”

“You’re telling me,” Dean grumbled. “Looking directly at it it like getting stabbed in the frickin’ eyeballs.”

“Usually, your eyes would slide over it to avoid discomfort, you wouldn’t even think about it. The only reason you noticed is because of Castiel.”

Dean elbowed the angel.

“Good eye, Cas.”

“She has to come back sometime before dawn,” Sam said. “So we’d better clear out.”

“Clear out?” Dean asked. “It’s coming back, what does it matter if it sees us?”

“She might go into a house instead and then there’s collateral damage. Staying under the radar is hard if there’s a dozen bodies and no explanation.” Michaela looked at the SUV again and winced.

“I’ll park around the block.”

“Better make it two blocks...your car is pretty distinctive.”

“We can’t all drive magicked cars that look like pieces of shit.”

“Well since my car is magicked, as you so aptly put it, I can probably park on the street as long as it’s not too close to that monstrosity,” she indicated the SUV with her thumb.

“Oh boy, four adults in a sedan. That’s my kind of party.”

“That doesn’t sound like your kind of party, Dean.”

“Never mind, I’m going to move the car. Just...stay here.”

“Where else would I go?”

“Just...never mind, Cas.”

Dean got in the Impala and drove at a snail’s pace down the street and turned the corner. The human, the angel, and the nephil watched the red of the taillights until they disappeared behind a house.

“He won’t park far,” Sam said, and neither Cas nor Michaela responded. Michaela leaned against her car and looked up at the sky, drawing out the current situation in her head--two humans, one angel, one nephil. Two magicked cars, about twelve or thirteen pounds of salt, and enough weapons to fit out a gang, if not a small army. Surrounded by civilian houses full of sleeping civilians. Somewhere on this base, a monster creeping through another window, soon to return to her car. If she did return and didn’t shelter in a basement or sewer. She muttered a curse and Cas looked over, startled.

“Where did you--”

“Gabriel.”

Castiel winced and she could almost see him smoothing the ruffled feathers of his invisible wings.

“With Michael as a sire...you should have much more power than you do.”

She grimaced.

“Three thousand years’ rent.”

“Rent?” Sam shifted from one foot to the other.

“Apparently the last thing my favorite uncle wanted was for me to grow up and realize that he could have summoned midwives or doctors to save my mother’s life. Or that if I got it into my mind, that I could crush him and my father like ants between my fingers.”

“That is an exaggeration,” Castiel said, but he said it quietly, almost gently.

“Perhaps. But while gods shifted in power and civilizations rose and fell, I was a handy battery.”

“Using your power while you were in the womb should not have removed that power, it should have recharged.”

“I don’t know, maybe I went bad. They left me in stasis too long. Maybe after I was born he needed a lot of power to make trouble or quell an uprising or a half-dozen other things. However powerful I was supposed to be, I’m not.”

“That’s probably to your benefit,” Cas said, and Michaela had a sudden, overwhelming urge to hit him.She didn’t though, partially because Dean appeared, one hand on his gun, and asked,

“What’s probably to your benefit?”

“Me not having all the power I should. Being an archangel’s child.”

“You never did tell us why that was.”

“I did, actually. You just missed it. I’m sure Sam or Castiel can fill you in.”

Dean looked like he was going to argue, but instead turned his attention to the SUV, wincing after a moment and looking away.

“So what’s the plan here?”

“Well according to the lore, they can’t be out in daylight and with the number of spells on that SUV, she won’t expect us to know that it exists, let alone that she’ll be back to get it.”

“So the plan is...wait?” 

Dean sounded more irritated than before and all three of the others looked at him with various degrees of concern.

“Unless you’ve got a better idea,” Sam said.

He didn’t.

“I guess you can fill me in on your whole super-nephilim thing then.”

Michaela bit her tongue and didn’t say anything.

“It’s not like we don’t have time.”

“I already told that story, thanks. And I don’t do encores.”

Dean smirked.

“That’s not what I remember.”

She laughed lightly and Dean’s smirk faded.

“I’m not that easy to bait, but thanks for playing. If we’re telling stories, why don’t you two share yours?”

“I thought you knew it already,” Sam ran a hand through his hair absently.

“I’ve heard stories, but not from the horse’s mouth.”

“You can speak to horses?” 

Michaela glanced at her uncle for a moment, realized he was serious, and shook her head.

“You have got to get out more.”

  
  


Dean was getting pretty damn tired of waiting. No salt-rounds, they made too much noise, no lassos or knives, just waiting in the dark between an angel he’d been to first base with in the seat next to him and his niece, a nephilim that had slept with him in order to swipe his property in the seat in front of him. He’d have bitched more about being in the car, but it hardly seemed worth it. Waiting was not his strong suit. Like conversations about feelings, vegetables that weren’t on a burger or deep-fried, and tolerance for bullshit, patience was another thing he just didn’t do. The night went on in silence, broken by the occasional passing car or far-off police siren, and whatever Sam and Michaela were whispering about in the front. Looking at the damn magicked SUV so often was giving him a headache. 

“What if she doesn’t return to her vehicle?” Castiel asked.

“We’re fucked,” Michaela replied. 

“I see.”

There was another full thirty minutes of silence before Dean felt a hand grip his thigh. He looked up, alarmed, and Cas pointed to a winged figure too large to be a bird. 

“She’s scouting,” he murmured and Dean elbowed Michaela who was already watching.

“My car’s got enough wards on it that she shouldn’t see it.”

“So does her car,” Sam said. 

“Her wards and mine are different. The point of hers are to make you look away. The point of mine are to make the object look unworthy of notice. Hers is a redirecting spell, mine just reinforces what you already think about a junk car parked on the street.”

“And if she spots us anyway?”

“We’re fucked,” Michaela said again with nearly the same intonation she had used earlier. 

“What do we do when she lands?”

Michaela held up several fist-sized cloth bundles.

“Salt bombs.”

“We’re going to throw bags of salt at the monster and hope that helps?”

“Sam explained how this worked an hour ago.”

Dean glanced at Cas, who nodded his confirmation.

“This close to dawn she can’t fly off, which means the salt grounds her and she has to fight us. She’ll probably try to make it to her car, counting on the spells to keep us from following her.”

“And it won’t because…”

Sam twisted in his seat to look at him.

“Were you not listening to a word we said in the past 2 hours?”

“You know me, Sammy. I just tune you out.”

This was the easy answer and had no traces of ‘I was having a minor crisis about my sexuality while staring into space’ in it, and thus was the answer that Dean went with.

“It won’t work because Michaela is staying in the car to follow her if she tries it; she and Cas can look at the car the longest before they get migraines or go blind. And because we’ll have three people, one on each side of the car, along with our getaway driver.”

“Right.”

The shape was getting lower, closer.

“Hang on…” Sam said slowly. “She doesn’t have any legs.”

“What?”

“What?”

“That can’t be good.”

Sam pulled a file folder of black-and-white pages photocopied and printed from the library and flipped through them.

“A manananggal is a type of aswang.”

“Very helpful, Sammy. The point?”

“They separate their upper bodies from their lower ones to hunt.”

“And?”

“If that’s her torso and she’s going to be driving a car...where are her legs?”

“Shit.”

“They have to be in the car,” Michaela said. “Well fuck, this is the opposite of what I wanted.”

“What do you mean the opposite?” Dean asked. “Set the car on fire. Unless she can grow new ones--she can’t grow new ones, can she?” 

“No,” Sam confirmed.

“Then she’s dead. This is a win, not a loss.”

“Does no one remember the charming lesbian couple? The one we told we would keep a low profile?”

“A car fire is low-ish profile.”

“On a military base? Have you ever been on one of these things? Everything’s a federal crime. We’re on federal land. One little car fire is way more serious here.”

“So what? We let her go? Sorry monster, killing you attracts too much attention. Go slaughter some more pregnant ladies.”

“For the love of--” Sam got out of the car and stalked towards the SUV, gun out.

“What the hell is he doing?” Michaela growled.

For the first time in what felt like days, Dean flashed her a wide, genuine smile.

“His job.”

And then he was out of the car as well, shortly followed by Cas.

Michaela swore and threw her hands up into the air. Keys in the ignition, she left the driver’s side door open and got out just as Sam smashed the butt of his gun into the front driver’s side window.

Michaela winced, waiting for the inevitable car alarm which never came. Sam unlocked the car manually and opened one of the rear doors. On the seat sat the prim lower half of the manananggal. Dean grinned and reached in to pull it from the car. Which is when the manananggal dove for them. One of its claws was inches from Dean’s face when a puff of white caused the thing to hiss in pain, then begin to shriek as the salt smoked on her skin.

“Burn the legs!” Sam shouted, and lobbed another salt bomb at the manananggal. Cas moved to flank Dean, guarding his back, angel blade drawn.

Fishing a bottle of lighter fluid from his pocket, Dean squirted the bottle over the detached legs and dropped his lighter onto them. 

Flames began licking up the legs and the torso of the manananggal shrieked again before dissolving into ash. 

By this time, doors were beginning to open and a handful of people hovered in their doorways.

“Sorry about this,” Michaela muttered more to herself than to the Winchesters as she marched over and slapped Dean full across the face with a shriek startlingly similar to the one the monster had made shortly before it burned to death.

“How could you?”

Cas lunged forward and Sam grabbed his arm, shaking his head. If the angel had really wanted to, he could have escaped the hunter easily, but instead he looked quizzically at the taller of the two Winchesters.

“Dean can handle this.”

“How could I?” Dean bellowed back. “I didn’t start this! Did you think I wasn’t going to find out?”

“I have no idea what’s going on.”

“I’ll explain in a minute.”

Michaela and Dean continued their shouting match until a couple of the bleary-eyed residents came out and cleared them out, sending Dean walking while Michaela climbed back into her car. 

“Come on,” Sam told the angel, handing him the keys to the SUV, which were a bit scorched but otherwise looked fine. “You drive. I don’t feel like going blind today.”

Castiel took the keys and climbed into the SUV, starting the engine as Sam tried to open the passenger door. After three times, he managed it, climbing into the passenger seat with a slightly green-tinted face.

“I’m just going to close my eyes. We need to abandon this somewhere off the base. Dean can pick us up.”

Castiel shrugged and drove.

  
  


Michaela met the Winchesters and Castiel at a diner about thirty miles outside of the military base. When they walked in she was already seated in a wrap-around booth in the corner, sipping a milkshake that was an improbable shade of pink.

“So,” she said conversationally.

“So,” Sam echoed.

“Case solved. Monster killed. Time to hit the road,” Dean said. “Thanks for the new monster to add to the book, don’t break in again unless you want to get shot.”

“Dean,” Sam admonished, and Dean shrugged.

“What, we’re encouraging people to break-and-enter now?”

“I already ordered you the biggest burger on the menu,” Michaela said, taking another sip of her shake.

“Well a meal before the road is always a good idea.”

The waitress arrived maybe five minutes later, bearing three plates of food. Sam’s was a grilled chicken...something with rice and gravy and a vegetable that once was green. Dean’s plate held a burger large enough to be a meal and a half without the sides of fries and onion rings. Castiel had a plate of hot wings.

“I don’t require food,” he said.

“Yeah but I thought it was funny.”

Castiel looked at the chicken wings, at Michaela, then back at the wings.

“Ah.”

Dean started to laugh but managed not to let it interfere with the burger he was trying to jam into his mouth. Michaela smiled around the straw of her milkshake and Castiel sighed deeply before picking up a chicken wing and taking a bite.

 

“I’ve got your numbers,” Michaela said as they stood up to leave. “So if anything comes up that I can’t get to…”

“Feel free,” Sam said.

“And if I ever need to borrow the bunker library, I’ll call first.”

“We’d appreciate it.”

She offered Dean a flirty smile.

“Try not to pick up any more nephilim in bars. I’ll start to suspect I started a trend.”

“You didn’t, but I’ll keep it in mind.”

She looked at Castiel then, and he at her. They just stared at each other in silence for several long moments.

“I guess I’ll see you at the next family reunion?”

Castiel didn’t smile, but he placed a hand on her shoulder.

“I doubt you’ll ever have the inclination, but if you want to know more about your father... from a less biased source than Gabriel...Sam and Dean can direct you to me.”

The nephil ignored the tightness in her throat and nodded.

“And if you need an abomination for anything,” she shrugged.

“Then I will find one who isn’t a relation.”

Michaela’s mouth opened and closed but no words came out. She was still gaping when the bell on the door tinkled to alert the diner that the Winchesters and Castiel had gone.


	8. For Just One Yesterday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A topic Dean has been carefully avoiding has to be faced.

A cross-country drive was usually the sort of thing to settle Dean’s mind, but this one only jumbled his thoughts more. Arriving back at the bunker meant that he and Cas would have a conversation that he’d been putting off for a long time--not just about what happened with the seduction spell but...everything. All the stuff that was between him and Castiel, all the stuff that had been there since he’d first seen the angel arrive in a crackle of lightning and the smell of ozone, a red handprint still imprinted on his bicep. 

Perhaps that was why he insisted they stop around 10 at night at a motel off a state route which hadn’t been repaved since Dean was in middle school. It’s definitely why he insisted that they get separate rooms, one for each of them despite the fact that Cas said he would be content staying in the car for the evening as he didn’t require sleep. And maybe that and Castiel’s almost-scary ability to sense his thoughts at the times he least wanted them sensed was why a knock on the door interrupted the intense staring contest that he was having with the ceiling of his motel room.

“Hello Dean.”

Dean turned around and walked back towards the bed, knowing Castiel would follow him. The angel stood awkwardly in the middle of the room as Dean dropped onto the end of the bed with a heavy sigh.

“Hi Cas.”

Neither of them said anything after that for a solid five minutes.

“Dean, I suspected you wouldn’t want to talk with me.”

“Did you?” Dean mumbled, rubbing the heels of his hands against his eyes.

“I did. I know that you said we would speak about what occurred last week when we returned to the bunker, but that seems increasingly unlikely.”

“You calling me a liar, Cas?”  
The angel hesitated and ploughed onwards.

“Not a liar no, but perhaps a selectively forgetful person.”

“So a coward, not a liar.”

“Dean, I didn’t say that.”

“What did you say, Cas?”

Another pause.

“You don’t want to talk about this but you said we would and you’re a man of his word. You also are one of the most stubborn people I have ever met. So I’m saying that I’m here to talk. While we’re alone and Sam isn’t around to interrupt and before we go back to the bunker and resume our usual activities.”

“Because you didn’t believe I’d actually bring it up.”

Cas blew air out of his nose in a frustrated huff.

“You’re trying to start an argument, but I will not be goaded into this.”

Dean scowled at him and slapped his knees as he pushed himself into standing.

“Fine, we’re not arguing. We’re talking. Look, here I am. So talk.”

“While we were under the influence of alcohol, you kissed me.”

Dean nodded sharply.

“Yeah.”

“And last week under the influence of an enchantment which caused both of us to become aroused, we watched each other perform a sexual act of self-pleasure.”

Dean’s jaw tightened and he nodded again.

“Yeah.”

“I have lived for eons, Dean. I have watched civilizations rise and fall but I continue to be puzzled by humanity. And this,” he made a vague gesture that encompassed himself and Dean, “This confuses me. You desire this vessel, but it shames you. Whenever something indicating physical attraction occurs between us, you deny it or say that it will not be spoken of again. What is it that you want from me?”

In contrast to Castiel’s inhuman stillness, Dean paced back and forth beside the bed. Castiel continued standing, his gaze following Dean’s almost-frantic movements through the motel room.

“I don’t...I don’t know how to do this!” Dean spat, like the words were poison he was clearing from his mouth. “You can just stand there and...and talk about this like it’s nothing. I don’t do chick-flick moments, I don’t talk about feelings, and I haven’t had this conversation since...God I don’t know since when!”

Castiel’s mouth thins into a line.

“How can you do this?” he asked evenly.

“What?”

“You said you can’t have this conversation under the current circumstances. Under what circumstances would this be possible?”

Dean opened his mouth to say how many bottles deep he’d have to be to talk about his relationship status when Cas amended,

“Under what circumstances that involve you still being in control of your faculties?”

He frowned.

“I am not having this conversation with you while you are mentally or emotionally compromised.”

“Compromised?”

“Under the influence of alcohol or drugs.”

“I know what you meant, Cas. I just…”

Dean resumed his pacing and Castiel continued standing.

“Is alcohol necessary because of the lowered inhibitions it brings?”

“Yes.”

“Are there other conditions in which you would have these conversations?”

Dean snorted. 

“Torture maybe.”

Cas flinched.

“I am not going to torture you, Dean.”

“No, I didn’t mean…”

“Is the idea of a conversation with me so painful that torture is preferable?”

The angel sounded wounded and Dean turned instinctively to face him, ready to protect Cas from whatever was hurting him. It was as his hand went to reach for a weapon that he was hit almost bodily with the realization that it was him that was hurting Cas. He himself was what he was trying to protect Cas from. And that realization was enough to push the words out of his mouth.

“It’s because of this, Cas. It’s because everyone I love gets hurt, everyone I love dies. The moment I say we can have...anything...is when I’ll lose you. And I can’t lose you, Cas. I just...I can’t. It would break me.”

Cas tilted his head to one side like a confused puppy.

“Dean...I am an angel of the Lord. I will not sicken or age or die.”

“No, not naturally you won’t. But have you seen my life--our life? Apocalypse, rebellion, angels and demons and monsters all fighting and trying to kill each other and us. I’ve killed an angel before, Cas. And so have you. We both know all it takes is the right blade in the right place.”

“You remain with Sam.”

“Yeah and look how that’s gone for us. Both of us in hell at least once, deals with demons, and besides all that, Sam is my brother. Take a look at the other people in our lives--our parents, Bobby, Lisa--I’m a poison, Cas. And on top of all that my dad--”

Dean snapped his jaw shut, cutting the words off before he could finish the sentence. 

“What does your father have to do with this?”

Dean pulled his lips tightly across his teeth into a grimacing smile.

“Cas, do you remember what it was like when your dad was around?”

“I served and obeyed, it was my purpose.”

“And what would you have done, Cas, if your dad had looked at you and told you that a part of you was--wrong. Even if he didn’t know it was a part of you. If he saw something in another angel and called it wrong and you knew that you had it too.”

“We are no longer speaking of my father,” Cas said slowly. 

Dean resumed his pacing.

“Your attraction to my vessel...your father would have disapproved.”

As Dean paced, Castiel watched him, deep in thought.

“Is this because the vessel is male?”

“Yes Cas, it’s because you’re a guy. Do you know what sorts of things I heard when I was a kid? Not just from Dad, from everywhere. Sick, perverted men who were hardly men at all because men liked women. A man who liked men was unnatural...queer.” The final word he spat out like venom.

“My father is utterly indifferent to sexual orientation, as am I.”

“Yeah, well. Great for you.”

Castiel hesitantly rested a hand on Dean’s shoulder as his frantic pacing cause him to pass the angel. Dean stopped, staring at the carpet, the ceiling, anywhere but at Castiel. 

“I am not my vessel, Dean. I inhabit this body as though it was my own; it was rebuilt and strengthened to hold me, but it is not who I am nor what I am.”

Dean remained standing a moment longer and then turned, letting his body fall onto the bed where he sat, Cas’s hand still on his shoulder. After a few seconds, the angel sat down beside him on the bed. He was quiet for perhaps half a minute.

“The vessel, the concern of my injury or death, the internalized homophobia, these are all branches.”

Dean raised his head from the intent study he was making of his knees.

“What?”

“Branches, Dean. They are related to the reason but they are not the reason itself.”

“Oh so now you know what I’m thinking? Could have made this conversation a lot easier if we’d done that from the start.”

_ He needed a drink, he needed something to make this less intense. _

“No, Dean. I am not reading your thoughts. I am piecing together all of this, as I once pieced you together. It is becoming clear now...you are afraid.”

Dean snorted.

“You got me Cas. I’m terrified of the Holy Tax Accountant.”

“No. You are afraid of intimacy.”

He snorted again.

“I can give you a long list of names that says you’re wrong.”

“Stop it.” Castiel sounded angry and Dean sat up to look at him.  
“Now you’re mad?”

“I know you, Dean Winchester. I pieced you together and made you whole. I have fought for you and fought with you and saved your life as you have saved mine. But if you will not do me the courtesy of being honest, I may have to agree that you are a coward.”

“Coward,” Dean repeated flatly.

“You can have physical intimacy or familial intimacy, but emotional intimacy is too much for you. You would rather face torture than discuss your emotions. You would rather grab moments with me in drunkenness or bespellment than speak honestly and have those moments be more than anomalies. Yes, you are a coward, nothing more and nothing less.”

Dean nodded, tight-lipped.

“If you were anyone else, Cas, I’d break your fucking face for saying that to me.”

“And you would still rather do that than admit you’d like to kiss me.”

Castiel stood, stone faced.

“I see this is how it is going to continue. I should have expected it, but after you said we would talk I had the foolishness to believe that you actually would speak with me. Stupid of me, I guess. I’ll go back to my room and watch one of your existential cartoons.”

Cas walked to the door, opened it, and let it swing shut behind him. Dean was alone.

Slamming both his fists down onto the mattress, Dean stared at the closed motel room door.

“Shit!”

He wanted to throw something, to break something, to get into a fight or kill a monster. He knew these things, he could do them and be done. There was no complication or confusion, just action and he wasn’t going to be able to let this hang where it was. He couldn’t let Cas call him a coward and walk away. 

Feeling sick to his stomach, he opened the motel room door and stepped into the hallway where Cas was halfway to the lobby.

“Cas, wait.”

The angel turned, his face still tight with frustration.

Dean licked his lips and said the hardest thing he had ever said, maybe was ever going to say.

“You’re right.”

Castiel froze.

“What?”

“You’re...can you just come back and talk? Actually talk. Like you wanted to...please.”

Honestly, it was the ‘please’ that made the angel pause. Castiel had seen Dean in tatters and in tears and dying. He’d seen Dean dead. Dean didn’t say please unless the circumstances were dire--life and death, souls hanging in the balance. The angel hesitated, uncertainty spread over his face. He studied Dean intently, trying to read the outcome of their conversation in the way the hunter stood, in the way he held his head and the tension in his shoulders. 

“Dean,” he said quietly, and he could feel the millenia he’d survived all of a sudden. He was tired in a way that angels rarely got--not physically tired but the sort of tired you got from lived experience, from years of memory and the knowledge that came with it.

“Please, Castiel,” Dean whispered.

Damn him.

The seraph fell for this human once before. He dropped into hell and retrieved his soul, he pieced Dean Winchester together, he branded his mark on the hunter’s arm. He carved his protection into his ribs. He tolerated and grew to enjoy Dean’s nicknames, his humor, his humanity. And now, with his name on Dean’s lips, his full name instead of the nickname he had grown to love, he couldn’t refuse. It wasn’t in him. Even beings of light and celestial intent had limits.

Cas nodded slowly and Dean waited for the angel to reach him before re-opening the door to his room, letting Cas enter before he followed.

“Okay,” he said. “Let’s talk.”

This time, Castiel sat on the bed. He stared at Dean, unblinking, and waited.

“I’m...not good at this.”

“I don’t need you to be good at this, Dean.”

Cas’s voice was low and serious, but his eyes were hopeful and it was the hope that gave Dean the courage to keep talking.

“I...don’t know how to do this. There was Cassie and there was Lisa but they were outside the life. They were someplace I could come to and not have to be this.”

He gestured at himself.

“I don’t know what you want, Cas. I don’t know how to do anything except fight and fix cars.”

“There are a great many things you excel at.”

Dean rubbed the heels of his hands over his eyes and shook his head.

“I can’t be your…”

His mind sorted through and tossed aside words. Boyfriend, lover, partner, relationship, none of them seemed to fit.

“I can be your friend, Cas. I can be your brother. I don’t know how to be anything else.”

“May I touch you?”

Dean stiffened and then nodded. Castiel’s hand took one of his and held it. After a moment, Dean gave in and asked the question.

“What are you doing?”

“I am showing you what I want from you, Dean. I want to be your comforter and protector with the knowledge that you are mine in return. Of course I want your body, Dean. And of course I want your heart. But I will not take what you are not ready to give. And I will not wait for the them if your willingness to share them will never come.”

Dean swallowed hard.

“That’s...a lot, Cas.”

“I am not asking for it all at once. I am not even asking for you to decide if you can give it all to me. All I am asking, all I have ever asked, was for you to tell me what you wanted and what you needed. Clearly, so that I will know whether I am to wait forever for something that will never be or if I am to adjust to the limits you have set.”

“Cas, what if I can never give you all of that?”

“I have seen every atom of your being, Dean Winchester. I know that you are capable of all of it. I just need to know if you are willing to try.”

Cas’s eyes were so damn blue and his expression so earnest, it almost hurt to keep looking at him. But Dean did. He looked at him long and hard and after what felt like years, like millenia, like all of time had passed them by, he sat down on the motel bed next to the angel. Their hands were still intertwined.

“Okay, Cas.”

A human might have cried, but Castiel was not human. Instead he gave Dean’s hand the gentlest of squeezes, enough to reassure him that he was still there, still waiting for when was ready.

“All I have ever asked is that you try, Dean. Nothing more.”

“And if I can’t be everything you want me to be?”

Cas’s eyes softened and he gave Dean a somewhat gummy smile.

“Dean,” he rumbled affectionately. “You already are.”


	9. (I Saved It All For You) For Just One Yesterday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Epilogue; a night time conversation between Dean and Castiel.

Castiel didn’t go back to his room that night. Dean slept and Cas sat on the bed beside him, half-watching, half-pondering. Dean, surprisingly, let him. Cas offered to go back to his own room, but Dean shook his head firmly.   
“This is something I can give you. Just try not to stare at me too much, okay?”  
There were endearments on Cas’s lips waiting to be said but he knew that Dean still wasn’t ready for that. The hunter was just adjusting to the idea of letting himself have something different with Castiel, he wasn’t ready to hear that he was beautiful, that if he had the option to watch Dean sleep and follow the flickers of his eyes under the lids, the faint glow of soul-light in his chest, he would do so for hours. So instead he simply nodded.  
He woke up unexpectedly sometime in the faint hours of what was technically morning but still felt like night. The motel clock blinked 12:00 at him and Dean yawned and rolled over.  
“Cas?”  
“Dean,” the angel replied.  
It was easier to talk in the dark; perhaps it was human nature for difficult topics to be easier to manage under the wings of night.   
“I know I said that I could try for you...but it’s going to take some time. A long time, probably. And you’re going to think that I forgot or I’m putting it off but I’m not. This is just a whole new thing, okay? I need to figure it out.”  
“I have waited far longer for things far less important than this,” the angel replied. He could have added that nearly everything was less important than this, than Dean, but he didn’t.   
“Usually I’m right into the sack is all and uh...I don’t want to...I mean I do want to but I don’t think I can...I mean I can but...I need to get it all straight in my head before that.”  
Castiel’s voice was amused and Dean could almost picture his expression, the half-smile that he often wore when dealing with a particular quirk of humanity with which he was beginning to get familiar.  
“What wouldn’t be too much?”  
Dean shrugged.  
“Just you and me stuff.”  
“Many things fall under that category. Are you referring to casual affection? Kissing? Pleasuring each other while clothed?”  
“Whoa Cas, um. I guess holding hands if it’s just us. Kissing would be…” he paused to swallow, “Nice too.”  
“So nothing public.”  
“Not because I’m ashamed of you or anything, I’m not. Fuck anybody who says something about you, I’ll kick their ass. I guess I gotta figure out me before I figure out anyone else.”  
Castiel was quiet and Dean reached out his hand across the bed. Cas took it and sat down on the bed beside him, squeezed his hand gently, reassuring.  
“Talking this way is easier for you? When you can’t see me?”  
“Talking in the dark is easier; I can’t feel you looking at me.”  
“You are aware that I can perceive you regardless of the light levels in the room?”  
“No, I know that. It’s a human thing.”  
“Very well.”  
It was quiet for a long time, then a longer one, and Dean’s breathing evened out again.  
“Sleep well, Dean.”  
Castiel didn’t let go of his hand until morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is the end of this particular series. If you're looking for smut, check out some of my other works and stay tuned for the next multi-chapter fic, tentatively titled "Bound". It will be rated M.
> 
> Thanks for keeping up with me for this ride, everyone.


End file.
